from the bake-a-bigger-pie dept

As surely as iPods will continue to outsell wax cylinders, the film and television industries are moving online. Really, the whole distinction of media that "is" or "isn't" online will sound ridiculous within a generation, and today's awkwardness is just an unavoidable transitional phase. Reluctance and momentum are keeping legacy structures intact, but in an increasingly ersatz manner that guarantees lots of anxiety at the big TV networks and movie studios. AVClub editor Todd VanDerWerff saw the signs everywhere during the recent Television Critics Association winter press tour:

For years, people who write about TV have been wondering just what the tipping point would be, when DVR usage, online streaming, and pirated viewing of TV broadcasts would become so significant that networks would essentially have to invent a new business model. The networks aren't at that point yet, but they're so close that everybody's talking about it with great confidence, as if the Internet hasn't thrown a great fear of the unknown into their souls. There's still far more money to be made in the old model, the sort of money that can still afford to produce big, ambitious shows like Revolution, as opposed to smaller-scale things like reality series and multi-camera sitcoms, than there is to be made under any new model. But the tipping point is almost here.

Is it ever. The news of big things happening with online service providers, especially Netflix, never stops pouring in. Though traditional analysts might recommend Disney start a cold war with Netflix, the companies instead recently entered an exclusive partnership to stream lots of content from Disney, Pixar and Marvel. There's only one part of that sentence I wish I didn't have to type: exclusive. It's a word that pops up all too much in recent news about evolving TV and movie business models.

Netflix has been stockpiling exclusive original content, including a lot of potential hits like the revival of Arrested Development, a new drama starring Kevin Spacey, a murder mystery produced by Eli Roth, a new Ricky Gervais series and more — all on top of deals like the one with Disney. Then there's the infamously closed-off HBO and its hoard of ultra-popular shows that can't be accessed without a full cable package plus an HBO subscription (and which also happen to be among the most pirated shows). HBO recently reached its own exclusive agreement, this time with Universal — to air the studio's films and keep them off of Netflix, along with the rest of the HBO catalogue. For at least ten years.

Paul Tassi has a good grasp on what this move really represents:

I think people are missing the larger idea of what's happening here, and that's HBO becoming the closest thing Netflix has to a direct competitor. The groundwork is already in place with the aforementioned Go service. Add in exclusive access to movies from all those studios, and $15 a month for HBO Go starts looking nearly as appealing as $15 a month for Netflix.

Basically, HBO is betting against cord-cutting, but also trying to compete in the online space, assuming that most people will keep their cable and pay extra for exclusive content plus digital access to that content. I can see that being true for a while (lots of people have both cable and Netflix), but it makes no sense in the long run. Eventually, HBO will be forced to offer some sort of online-only subscription.

But will even that be enough? Here's where we get back to the exclusivity problem. All these exclusive deals are serving to fragment a market that doesn't yet have clearly defined rules for delivery. Exclusivity is a great thing for creators to sell, and a great thing for businesses to leverage, but in this transitional phase for distribution models, it's harming everyone involved by making sure piracy retains its biggest advantage: comprehensive access. Networks have always had exclusive shows, but they all ended up in the same place — your television, delivered through a single antenna. Then later you needed not just an antenna, but a cable, to get everything. Then later you needed to pay more for specific cable channels to get certain shows — and lo and behold, those shows were among the first and most widely pirated.

The knee jerk reaction to piracy's unflagging popularity is to assume that, as the mantra goes, "people just want everything for free." But as the evidence that pirates buy more media has continued to pile up, that idea has been stripped of its credibility.

As some people have been pointing out for years, piracy's real advantage lies elsewhere: convenience, selection and availability. Piracy is currently the fullest realization of the internet's potential as a culture-machine: virtually any movie, any TV series, any song, any obscure documentary or bootlegged live performance, all accessible to anyone. No need to subscribe to multiple different providers; no release windows or geographical barriers. The fact is that no other means of obtaining media has matched piracy in terms of sheer selection and accessibility, so naturally it has never gone away, even though it has many significant flaws like spammy sites and spotty quality control.

I'm not saying everyone should hand everything to Netflix — only that service providers, studios, networks and everyone else involved need to employ a little game theory and figure out how to move the business forward to everyone's benefit. This means partnerships that allow more sharing of content, new infrastructures that make delivery and payment more seamless, and the undeniably challenging elimination of geographical restrictions and other obsolete licensing concerns. As the world moves away from the captive audience and towards a culture of infinite choice, expecting people who want comprehensive access to buy multiple different subscriptions from multiple different companies is tragically foolish. The culture machine has been built; pirates shouldn't be the only ones using it properly.

Re:

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that pretty much how all their 'nifty' little services work? Where you have to have a cable subscription, and then pay on top of that to get access to their stuff, with no real option to just subscribe to their service directly?

Re: Re:

Doh, just realized you were talking about Hulu, not HBO. Guess they've already got me associating anything idiotic regarding cable automatically with HBO, and I just skipped right past the part mentioning it was some other company this time around.

Personally, I think that cable companies lost sight of how they even came to dominance and that is their weakness.

When I first subscribed for cable, it wasn't to get 400+ channels, but rather for the movie channels. Paying a premium to watch movies at home was worth it. After a decade or so, cable just seemed the way to consume TV programming and I re-upped without thinking about it.

That is how we humans work. We do a lot of things out of habit and without really thinking about it.

While the entertainment industry sorts out it's "new" business models, there is a generation growing up that just doesn't care about the industry's evolution. In other words, that generation is habitually turning to "pirate channels" for access to entertainment. They hop on the net and don't even think to look to the "official" source of the content. I can think of the first few times I went to abc.com, hbo.com, disney.com, etc, looking for content and it wasn't there. After finding what I was looking for elsewhere, I was "trained" not to even bother looking at those sites again.

Why don't "pirates" feel any remorse? Because they are paying for the broadband that brings them the access. It's not that people don't want to pay, it's that they feel they have paid already. Companies and the convolution of copyrights and licenses seem to think that selling the same content over and over to the same consumer is a smart play, but the consumer quickly gets tired of paying several times for the same thing.

Broadcast TV and Google already have the "new" business model. It's called advertising and it's worth billions of dollars; and it's much more consumer friendly than labelling your customers as pirates and thieves.

Re: Preach it

Which is why I don't go to movie theaters any more. It's one thing to pay $10 to see a movie, and $5 for a box of popcorn. It's another to pay those high prices, AND THEN HAVE TO SEE COMMERCIALS FOR PRODUCTS, not movies.

If you want me to watch your commercials, then the content needs to be cheap or free. Not borderline obscene.

Re: Re: Preach it

I used to and still do like movie previews. I may rarely go to the theatres anymore but I do like them. What I do not like are product advertisements. I went to the movies. If I wanted product advertisements I would wait for the movie to come to over the air TV.

Re: Re: Re: Preach it

My wife likes the movie previews as well. I don't understand why. To my mind, they're just ads like any other. Worse, in some ways, because they almost invariably fail to give any clue as to whether or not I'd like to see the movie.

Re: Preach it

Don't know if a lot of you are too young, but remember when cable had little to no commercials? The deal was you were already paying a premium, so you didn't have to deal with (as many)ads. And then slowly, over time, more and more ads were added in, to the point where it's the same as the networks....only with the extra cost to get the channels.

So we're now to the point where we're paying money, paying more money to have channels we want, which we're forced to take on others we don't want, being sold products every couple of minutes, paying more money to have internet, and then are told to pay more, to see the content we're already paying 1, 2, or 3 times already for, only in a very slightly different form.

So, yea, I rejected that idea, and I grew up/lived through it. It's no surprise those who didn't go through the process rejected it even faster.

Re: Preach it

An understandable fallacy, but a fallacy nonetheless. ISPs contribute nothing towards creating the content you get via their pipes. Expecting to get the content for free just because you pay for the pipe is like expecting to get free gas just because you pay taxes for the roads, and that those who get the gas out of the ground should provide it for free.

Maybe ISPs should pay 'something' to content creators, but they're fighting tooth and nail to avoid doing that, or do anything about the 'illegal' content they're happy to let you get via their pipes. Ditto with advertising - Google is the 2nd heaviest advertiser on pirate sites and makes billions from it - but pays nothing to those whose content gets you to those sites. Yes, Youtube is finally paying something on those ads (not a lot) to content creators but if you're only prepared to pay a SMALL premium to avoid it - where is the income that content creators need to make the content going to come from ?

This is the point few tech bloggers are ever happy to face. The biggest cost to content creators is TIME. Time to practice their art, time to get better at it, time to actually make it. Just occasionally someone may say 'well, we have to work out some way for artists to get compensated' - while at the same time saying that at no point should consumers actually have to pay anything at the point of consumption. And then you say you don't want advertising, or to pay too much to avoid it.

You simply can't have it both ways. You can't have 'free' content and expect those who create it not to get paid. You just can't. Making content always costs money. And at the moment a lot of very big companies are making very serious money out of all that free content while giving nothing back to those who make it, and running very expensive lobbying campaigns to make sure they never have to.

In the meantime many content creators like me are simply giving up making it. We have bills, mortgages, families, just like you. If we can't make a living out of what we do then we have to stop. I've long since given up making 'records' in any serious way- there's just not enough money in it any more. So I write music for TV, film, and ads instead. I'd rather not but that's the way it has to be. And the 'art' music comes last, a very low priority that hardly gets any time. Cos it's TIME we need, and that's what the money is for. Except there is no money these days - or not enough. So the art is getting made.

Re: Re: Preach it

Re: Re: Preach it

I can, to some degree, sympathize from where you are coming from. I once had a promising career drawing engineering designs by hand that was supplemented by technology.

You come to this debate with a firm assertion that copyright is the only answer to making sure artists get paid. I am not so convinced of that. The legal threat of copyright as a means for artist to get compensated is a relatively new concept to human history.

As for the part about:

...lot of very big companies are making very serious money out of all that free content while giving nothing back to those who make it...

Name me a time, in the history of copyright, where "some big company" wasn't exploiting artists for fun and profit.

Maybe so, but having everything in one place creates monopolies and that is worse for consumers. The biggest companies would just use their financial power to keep smaller companies out of the market. Look at the monopoly Sky has on UK paid TV.

Re: Re:

"it should probably be "everything in one place, and another place, and another too"."

That's what would make more sense in a free market. If services just competed on price, quality of service, reliability, ease of use, etc. then there wouldn't be a problem. So far they only seem to be competing on being the only place to get something, then restricting even access to that place even further (need to have a cable restriction for HBO, regional restrictions, etc.).

The business model is predicated not on what they offer, but what they can stop others from offering. That's bound to get a consumer backlash - whether it takes the form of piracy or simply going without the content is irrelevant to the outcome, especially if there's no legal way for some people to access it otherwise.

Re: Re: Re:

"So far they only seem to be competing on being the only place to get something, then restricting even access to that place even further (need to have a cable restriction for HBO, regional restrictions, etc.). "

Of course they do! Their entire business model is predicated on creating scarcity where none exists.

Re: Re:

The Answer

The answer to monopolies is an end to copyright and the advancement of existing peer to peer networking technology so that all the information is available without any central hub whatsoever.

I'm thinking wireless is the thing that will finally allow that to happen in a way the government/corporate diad can't shut down, but that would need to be a fully wireless internet, which still leaves the hardware gurus in control.

Peer to peer wireless without any central registration necessary....? Maybe? Does that already exist? I don't think that exists.

Re: The Answer

You're talking about an ad hoc network. In concept it's possible, however it's impractical. Current wireless technology available to consumers just doesn't afford the capacity to achieve what you're suggesting. It would require purpose built hardware to meet the needs of such a network. It would also require the compliance of a great number of people in close proximity (i.e. within your own city block) to propagate the network. It would be a huge cooperative effort.

Re: Re: The Answer

Thanks for the info.

I also tend to get the idea that as technology useful for subversion advances, so too does the technology useful for opression. Still, it seems we are fast approaching a point where one person can do enough to be a real thorn in the side of the government without a lot of cooperation with other people. Just... not using THIS method.

Re:

Universal access to everything should be the goal here. If you don't make the entire library of content available, regardless of network/creator, from the word "go", then you've failed. People want to have easy, instant, and total access to all content without barriers or they will just go to the P2P networks and serve themselves.

Re:

Well, removing the false scarcity by removing exclusivity would almost completely remove the problem. Exclusivity is a bad model for consumers. I would even go so far as to say that it can very well be bad for business since selling 2000 non-exclusive sale-rights will take 20 times the price from the 100 exclusives, not to mention the cummulative extra sale because international companies do not have to worry about when the exclusive deals run out in their countries!

Just that small change in the business model would improve the situation so immensely.

IP

What rubs me the wrong way about IP is what rubs me the wrong way about interest. Someone, somewhere, is getting paid NOT to work, and the person paying them is having to sacrifice something real for something that is not real.

In lending, the thing that is not real is the medium of sale. That is, you are "buying" the right to buy, which you already had as it turns out. In IP, you are buying the right to copy.

IP is worse because at least when you buy money, there is some convenience in having this generic intermediate trade good. But being required to buy a copy of something I could more easily and cheaply copy myself is rather infuriating.

Candles

Candles outsell IPODs. I honestly have no intention of looking to see to what extent they might or might not result in more profits, but in terms of the number of sales, and the bulk of the goods, I am sure they do.

Television Critics Association winter press tour:

I feel like banging my head against the wall when I read some of this stuff:

"For years, people who write about TV have been wondering just what the tipping point would be, when DVR usage, online streaming, and pirated viewing of TV broadcasts would become so significant that networks would essentially have to invent a new business model."

Um... THAT WAS TEN YEARS AGO, GET WITH THE TIMES DINOSAURS.
Ahhh. Feel slightly better.

The studios in their current form will never get with the times. Ever.

The Other Solution

I think your rosy predictions for the future are missing one very real possibility, Mr. Masnick. The technology behind the internet can be made much more complex by the ubiquitous use of security and tracking technology, and the entire current model can then be moved online intact, thus preserving the banking industry's interest in having guaranteed profits and the general interests of the very powerful in keeping a lid on free expression without having to actually arrest anyone.

This is basically what happened with satellite. It was far to easy for people to get satellite dishes, and no one was buying that it was criminal to set up a dish to catch the signals now being sprayed pell mell across the face of the earth. But with the introduction of encryption, we simply banned decryption without permission. The technology was just complex enough to prevent easy access, and the legal sanction just strong enough and acceptable enough to prevent commercial circumvention.

Re: The Other Solution

Considering the tradeoffs that would be required for something like that to actually work(goodbye privacy and anonymity among others), don't know about Mike, but I would most certainly object to such a thing.

Re: Re: The Other Solution

Because the government and large corporations have been doing such a poor job of doing away with your privacy and anonymity?

People keep trying to treat the internet like a private room. What you're really doing is shouting across the continent on a shared communication line. Scary or not, a reasonable person should have about the same expectation of privacy on the internet that they have sitting in a restaurant. Privacy rights, ultimately, are not going to stand up to this even if we had good faith bargaining partners across the table in the distribution industry.

Re: The Other Solution

You seem to have missed the point (in addition to missing the author).

We already have people trying to use laws and technology to lock down the internet and make it behave the way they want it to -- that's been going on for years. And it's ineffective and breeds lots and lots of piracy.

Re: Re: The Other Solution

LOL, I did miss the author didn't I? So humiliating.

My point is that this battle is not at an end, and that it has been fought before, and lost, by people wanting freer and more open access. The internet is not immune to this. It's just taking them longer.

The real issue is copyright law itself, and anything short of either a complete destruction of copyright or a sharp curtailment of it to something on the line of a handful of years is not going to help. And I don't see enough people with the political will to insist on that, even here on Techdirt.

Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

The internet is such a fundamentally different type of network than anything which has come before that I actually think it is indeed immune to control.

Nevertheless, you're not wrong -- lots of people are still doing everything they can to lock it down. But that's precisely my message to such entities: doing so ensures piracy will continue to flourish.

Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

What DO you think of copyright? I guess that's the core of my objection. You have a lot more faith in the complexity of the system making it immune to central control than I do. Through a combination of making it technically harder to circumvent without getting caught and building the social pressure to conform, they can get what they want I think unless people's values can be made to change such that they understand that the very core of the current system - the right to demand people buy from a certain source by law - is unjust.

And again, I am not seeing the commitment I would like to see from folks to changing that paradigm.

I mean, no one owes me that, but I think it is the true root of the problem, and I am not sure you share that view.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

What DO you think of copyright?

Many, many things... it's a complex topic. If I were to attempt to sum up my views on copyright, it would go something like this:

There is absolutely a fundamental injustice to a system that places restrictions on the sharing of culture, because I do not believe people have an innate right to control their creations beyond the initial decision to share those creations with anothe person. I do however think that (a) there are ways of respecting creators that I personally see as morally correct (e.g. properly attributing people in most circumstances, finding ways to support the creative endeavours of people whose output you regularly enjoy) and (b) there is a valid economic argument for offering creators some kind of commercial advantage when it comes to their own work. However, with regards to (b), I think there are ways to accomplish this that do not stem from fundamentally incorrect notions of "ownership" and "control" and instead properly frame things as incentives granted by society for the purpose of supporting an economically healthy creative culture. I do not know precisely what form such a system would take.

You have a lot more faith in the complexity of the system making it immune to central control than I do. Through a combination of making it technically harder to circumvent without getting caught and building the social pressure to conform, they can get what they want

The thing is, certain industries have been pouring endless resources into developing new technological means of control for years now, all to no avail. Every iPhone is jailbroken; every DRM is cracked; every movie is pirated. Technological efforts have never made a dent.

As for the social battle, it's been ongoing forever. Before the VCR was strangling women, home taping was killing music, and way back in the 30s evil robots were eating musicians. But none of these social campaigns have succeeded in holding back technology or reducing piracy.

However, it's true that there is a culture clash—copyright policy has bred the "ownership culture" we discuss so much here, and it's a very bizarre thing. Many people believe in its values (a creator's innate control and moral authority) without realizing that their normal daily behaviour with regards to media actually subverts those values (a true believer would triple-check every YouTube video they watch for legitimacy). This is something that's beginning to change, sometimes in unexpected ways, and it's definitely important for those of us who understand the necessary sea change to make sure our voice is a part of that conversation.

I am not sure you share that view.

Then I think you should pay closer attention to what we write about here :)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

Tee hee.

I think you do share my view on copyright. I am still utterly unconvinced that technology is what is going to push us through to a more open society though. You say that this has been ongoing, and that the technology keeps being "broken", but the percentage of people who make use of all of these hacks is, at least as far as I can see, vanishingly small. And it is precisely the overreaction of the powerful to this tiny minority that tends to eventually get them what they want.

I don't know... all a matter of persepctive I suppose. Thanks for your time though. It was refreshing to get some one on one time with the person who wrote the stuff being promoted by a particular outlet.

I do read you guys, more apparently than you know, and have been reading for over a year before I suddenly went spastick with posting on your comments section. =)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

Thank you. I fully agree with EVERYTHING you said there. What you said is exactly what I believe with copyright, especially the fact that if I was to attempt to be a good little boy, I would end up having to triple check every single piece of media I consume (and undoubtedly fail, since there is no such thing as a Central Copyright Database).

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

Society already provides creators 'incentive' to create. It's called wages. So many content 'creators' are works-for-hire, and these seem to be plentiful enough. Of course, then you have to incentivise the 'hiring' and funding...

Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

It would be apart from problems that limit the ability of the individual to operate their own servers, the use of dynamic IP's for domestic connections, and often terms of service that prohibit setting up servers. This allows more or less centralised control over mail, blogs etc.

Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

Have you not seen them illegalizing tech itself when it outpaces their ability to regulate?

I just do not think you are quite getting what is at stake for these people. They are not now, nor have they ever been, all about progress. They are about control. For a number of reasons, some of them perhaps legitimate, but none of them convincing to me, they see danger in too much freedom, and perhaps especially freedom of people to choose what sorts of ideas they are regularly exposed to.

Nor is this a mysterious, black suited "they". The folks who shuttle back and forth between the highest offices of government and the highest offices of corporate power are an openly identifiable group of folks.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

You keep accusing me of not getting it, which makes me think you don't read Techdirt very often.

We expend a great deal of time scrutinizing and criticizing those folks who shuttle back and forth between the highest offices of government and the highest offices of corporate power, analyzing and mobilizing against the laws they write, dissecting the business decisions they make... Fighting to create a healthy ecosystem for innovation and creativity is the whole point of Techdirt.

It seems like the only point you are trying to make is "optimism is foolish"—but that's only true of the most simplistic optimism. I'm well aware of the scale of the challenge here—and I remain optimistic in the face of it.

Re: Re: Re: The Other Solution

I will say that I had Netflix, and then they decided to up the price on their combined package. I wanted both the streaming AND the blue ray, and they punked me, so I dropped them.

That was my experience exactly. I'm not sure how they knew that Arrested Development is the one thing (apart from the never-gonna-happen revival of Firefly) that could lure me back into their clutches. Dammit.

There is no police in those networks, there is no surveillance in those networks, there are no rules.

You can use that to distribute the Super Ball to all your friends, they all pay you a little, way less what they would pay for the premium cable channel and you stream it to them and they can record it unencrypted without problems.

It is just amazing how some people still believe in the "we just need it to make hard for the casuals", no you have to make it hard to the most tech savvy crowd in the world, because if only one of them can copy it all other barriers crumble.

DVB(Digital Video Broadcast) is ridiculously easy to hack.

Can you see the problem with the assumption that it only needs be difficult for the casual pirate?

In a city with millions of people or even tens of thousands only one needs to be able to decode it for all the others to get access to it and they can do it in a way that would be very difficult to do any enforcement.

Re: Re: The Other Solution

Re: Re: The Other Solution

I understood your model before you posted. What you are missing is that I and a lot of people like me are about as high tech a friend as a lot of people have, and I don't have any real interest in hacking. Many people don't have any interest in seeking out a hacker. Those of you in the community seem to think it's ubiquitous, but it doesn't seem to be so from my experience.

The system as they envision it can withstand some low level siphoning. It is the wide open fire hydrant stuff they want tamped down.

I don't know but that in the end they might settle on an IP tax on the internet as a whole, and before long you would just find the cost attached to any internet service you use. That's how they dealt with cassette tapes.

Re: Re: The Other Solution

I understood your model before you posted. What you are missing is that I and a lot of people like me are about as high tech a friend as a lot of people have, and I don't have any real interest in hacking. Many people don't have any interest in seeking out a hacker. Those of you in the community seem to think it's ubiquitous, but it doesn't seem to be so from my experience.

The system as they envision it can withstand some low level siphoning. It is the wide open fire hydrant stuff they want tamped down.

I don't know but that in the end they might settle on an IP tax on the internet as a whole, and before long you would just find the cost attached to any internet service you use. That's how they dealt with cassette tapes.

HBO Go != Netflix Competitor

I think people are missing the larger idea of what's happening here, and that's HBO becoming the closest thing Netflix has to a direct competitor. The groundwork is already in place with the aforementioned Go service. Add in exclusive access to movies from all those studios, and $15 a month for HBO Go starts looking nearly as appealing as $15 a month for Netflix.

I don't consider that a competitor at all, certainly not one for the same price. Because in order to get that you need the $100+ cable package, which is why it will never compete directly against Netflix.

Re: Re: HBO Go != Netflix Competitor

I would think that the 10 year deal with Universal would prevent that, since the whole point is to force people to continue paying for cable. If HBO just bypasses that for their own service without Netflix, Universal is just as screwed as if they went to Netflix

Re: Re: Re: HBO Go != Netflix Competitor

"If HBO just bypasses that for their own service without Netflix, Universal is just as screwed as if they went to Netflix"

I don't see this. I can see it being in Universal's best interests to get people to continue to pay for cable as (IIRC) they're partially owned by Comcast. If they can get the best of both worlds, that makes some sense.

But, they stand to lose money if they open up the service to people who can't or won't be on Comcast, potentially millions more customers accessing their content at a charge? Even if the reason they do that is because the cable lock-in market is no longer viable? That doesn't make sense.

Either way, I don't see how it would be a bad thing for HBO unless their contract specifies they must keep the cable lock-in - which is a very bad idea straight away and so they deserve what they get in that case.

The entertainment industry has been following the pay for this channel before you can pay for the extras channels, and put all the good stuff on as many extra channels as they think people will pay for. The idea is to extract as much money from their audience as they can get and never mind the inconvenience.

Re: Need a bigger pipe

The fatal flaw in this article

figure out how to move the business forward to everyone's benefit

The only benefit gatekeepers are interested in is their own. So this is where your argument breaks down. The gatekeepers will never realize that benefiting customers also benefit themselves. It seems to be some kine of blindness on their part, either willful or other wise.

BTW, I do agree that all content needs to be universally available. There is no way I am subscribing to HBO Go, Netflix and Amazon Prime in order to get the content I want. I will do without before paying for multiple services.

I just want to call bullshit on the 'death of large budget shows'. It may be the death of 'large budget unwanted crap shows', but that's different.

Isn't that what they claimed killed Arrested Development, the budget was too expensive? Yet, years later, it is still worth producing new episodes to be released online?

Maybe it's the rebirth of 'Large budget because it's got the quality to deserve a big budget' so that the big budget entertainment will be good because the creators are more cautious than to assume throwing more money into advertising will make up for the lack of quality.

Re:

I don't think VanDerWerff intended to say that such shows are going to go away -- simply that, at the moment, we are still on this side of the tipping point, where the folks with the money to fund such shows are the same folks trying to prop up and protect the old model. But, as he says, the tipping point is almost here -- and then it will be Netflix or someone like that funding the next Game of Thrones (still a far more expensive undertaking than Arrested Development, no matter how much those actors' salaries have gone up over the past few years)

A little reality pill

I already avoid HBO because I don't think it merits the cost. Cable movie channels have the same exclusivity problem that is being associated with streaming services in the article. That means you have to subscribe to ALL the movie channels to get full coverage.

I'd rather not bother with any of them, including HBO.

As far as expensive shows on other networks go: The prevalence of cheap crap makes the entire cable subscription seem stupid. Those stupid reality shows will kill the gravy train because people will associate their overpriced cable bill with Cajun Pawn Stars rather than game of thrones.

It may be too late

This article and the discussions in the comments seem a bit dated considering we live in a world where a cheap computer and a $20 HTPC remote can be loaded with free easy to use software that can stream virtually any tv show or movie ever made through a broadband connection without the threat of being sent infringement notices.

I think the wound is mortal and the patient just doesn't realize it yet.

Hehe

*Which is why I don't go to movie theaters any more. It's one thing to pay $10 to see a movie, and $5 for a box of popcorn. It's another to pay those high prices, AND THEN HAVE TO SEE COMMERCIALS FOR PRODUCTS, not movies.*

Yep, with you 100%.

It's why people rarely worry about being 'late' for a movie - you just miss the ads anyway.

I don't mind seeing a couple previews - but it's getting ridiculous. What's worse is the ton of ads on the DVD's I buy - but there's an easy fix for that... But the DVD you want, rip it to a digital file and put it on a writable DVD.

Not concerned

I will pay when there is a service for $10/mo, that I can't access from outside the U.S.

Fuck Netflix, Hulu and HBO. In my small European country, the only way to watch anything I want to watch is and will stay Bittorrent.

Wouldn't I love to have a device to watch or listen to anything ever recorder in the history of ever? Yes. Not going to happen legally.

Netflix and Hulu are Internet companies who serve only one country. This is so rock-fuck stupid I can't finish this sentence, it shuts my>/i> brain off.

Also, yeah, I'm not paying for any less than full access to everything ever recorded, for a flat rate of about $20/mo as a basic service, and that also needs to let me spend money on artists I like enough.

Re: Not concerned

To be fair, Netflix has expanded to many countries outside of the US, although they currently have little presence in Europe apart from the UK and Scandinavia - countries that were also served by Lovefilm. Somehow, I think it's the studios, not Netflix, the needs the blame here...

I just posted this Jan 13th to my FB wall

To all those that snicker and say but that's illegal when I mention where I got this or that.. Paul Tassi, a Forbes contributor, seems to sum up the situation well:

"Piracy is not raiding and plundering Best Buys and FYEs, smashing the windows and running out with the loot. It’s like being placed in a store full of every DVD in existence. There are no employees, no security guards, and when you take a copy of a movie, another one materializes in its place, so you’re not actually taking anything. If you were in such a store, you’d only have your base moral convictions to keep you from cloning every movie in sight. And anyone who knows how to get to this store isn’t going to let their conscience stop them, especially when there is no tangible “loss” to even feel bad about."

'Works for hire"

Just to say that I personally won't make 'works for hire' (ie, no further payment from broadcast) if asked to - if I did, I couldn't make any kind of living. They just don't pay enough up front. This entire discussion is purely from the consumer's point of view. And fair enough. But the lack of knowledge displayed by you guys about the realities of trying to create the content you all want, is astounding. Movies and music cost money to make- especially high quality work. Without some payment made according to how many people access the content - ie, copyright- none of us could afford to make high quality work. Of course you all want everything ever made at a price that's as close to zero as possible. But you may find that in a world like that all you'll find is lowest common denominator work that even you guys would find unwatchable. Cos no one could afford to make anything ekse

Re: 'Works for hire"

I don't see what makes you think I don't want anyone to make money. That's exactly the opposite of what I want.

Yes I am speaking from a consumer perspective -- by talking about how to compete with piracy, which the industry claims is one of the biggest things hurting it financially. As I pointed out, the issue is not that people want everything for free -- it's perfectly possible to charge money and still beat piracy, but only if you start tackling this problem of access and availability.

The current fragmentation of content is an issue -- it's as if you had to sign up with 3 different cable providers just to get all the channels you want (look at how upset people get when even one popular network disappears from their single cable provider).

I'm not saying things need to be free. I'm certainly not saying there should be no competition. I'm not even saying that exclusive deals should disappear entirely. I'm simply saying that it's in all these providers' best interest (financial and business interest) to make it easy for people to pay a reasonable price for all the content they want in a simple, seamless manner. They are rushing to hungrily slice up the pie before its finished -- they should recognize that there's value in working together to make the pie even bigger.

Re: 'Works for hire"

This entire discussion is purely from the consumer's point of view. And fair enough. But the lack of knowledge displayed by you guys about the realities of trying to create the content you all want, is astounding.

In my opinion, the discussion needs to be centered around the consumer's point of view.

Take for an example a real world manufacturing scenario such as this:

I create a really useful widget that I have spent lots of money to research, develop, buy raw materials, buy production machinery, secure factory floor space, pay overhead and employee costs. These are all factors that I have to consider when set my price. But they are not the only factors I have to consider. The most important factor I must consider is what my customer's will feel is a fair price for my widget. If I price my widget higher than that, people won't buy it (or they will buy a knock-off from China instead) and I lose money. If I have to price it lower than my cost, then it is completely my responsibility to reduce my manufacturing costs in order to compete effectively. It is never, ever my customer's responsibility to pay more than they think it's worth.

When comes to copyright and content production the industry seems to always fail to take into consideration what the market feels is a fair price. You spending a ton of money to produce your content doesn't factor into my decision to buy in the slightest - I'm looking to purchase at price I feel is on par with how I value the product, not on par with how you value your product.

Re: Re: 'Works for hire"

Bringing China into this though raises a point I do not think most discussing these issues understand. No small part of why it is cheaper in China is the money market. Dollars buy more in China because of perceived power and reliability, which in turn is based on the strength of our banking system, our corporate system, our armed forces, and a lot of other things.

Finance turns on banking, and an entertainment market without IP is a market where the artist is left behind in terms of finance. The distributors can get finance. They are making hardware that everyone has to use. The artist cannot.

I'm not pro IP. In fact, I am rather rabidly anti IP. More so I think than the folks who run this site. But until the question of how IP deregulation interacts with finance as it pertains to getting loans, as opposed to collecting money from customers, it is not going to go very far. Getting loans is where it's at in modern finance. Private capital is more expensive than bank capital because people are not allowed to lend money they do not have. Banks are.

Re: Re: Re: 'Works for hire"

Finance turns on banking, and an entertainment market without IP is a market where the artist is left behind in terms of finance. The distributors can get finance. They are making hardware that everyone has to use. The artist cannot.

Perhaps. Even so, this too is changing.
Kickstarter and other innovative ideas are already reshaping this landscape. The need for huge amounts of capital to produce entertainment is lessening and will most likely continue to decrease. The internet and technology are eroding these barriers to entry in the same way they have with distribution, promotion and the sound engineering aspects of the music industry. Just my 2˘ worth.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: 'Works for hire"

Creepy? You're easy to creep out.

Yes, a little creepy.

After my initial confusion trying to figure out who the hell you were responding to and then realizing it was yourself, it made me think I wasn't really needed in this conversation. The local homeless guys I see walking around carrying on animated conversations with themselves also creep me out a bit.

I quoted it because you seem to have missed it, given your comment.

You also seemed to miss the part of my comment where I stated that I feel the need for securing huge amounts of capital from the traditional sources to produce content is lessening, because of things like Kickstarter combined with the reduced need for such capitol in the first place.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: 'Works for hire"

Bottom line, any financing option that excludes banks while the banking industry controls the flow of capital in the entire economy is doomed.

Yes, that's the *bottom line* of the economy -- but it's silly to suggest that means alternate funding models are doomed. You might as well say garage sales are doomed -- after all I don't go through a bank to give some cash to my neighbour for a rocking chair.

All money comes from banks, as you clearly know, but it still gets passed around later. Private funding is not "doomed" because, ultimately, the money still came from a bank at some point, whether it's a $10 kickstarter pledge or a $10-million private investment. That's the astonishing thing about the fractional reserve banking economy -- people can earn and save and trade lots of money, but at the end of the day, though there may be fifty degrees of separation between their money and the bank, it's still all somehow contributing to the system whereby all money eventually flows back to the bank as loan payments.

Kickstarter is no more doomed for "excluding" banks than lakes are doomed for "excluding" the ocean